Hong Guoguo felt like her brain was still a chaotic mess.
She had originally only gone out to gather some intelligence, but ended up trapped with no way out. Normally, that wouldn't have been a big deal—hiding for a while usually sufficed. What she completely hadn't expected was why a behemoth that looked so terrifyingly powerful would come flying toward her location!
As a member of the Cat-Demi-human race, she could clearly sense the incomparably vast aura emanating from that giant beast... and that sense of horror, that feeling of total helplessness that made resistance impossible when the creature swung its wings. She felt that even the giant dragons of her home world weren't as powerful as the beast before her eyes.
She had been completely scared witless. She truly thought she was going to die there; after all, there was no way to escape such a terrifying attack!
But then... the moment that attack struck... her vision blurred, and she found herself back at the clinic. Furthermore, there was another person there who also had cat ears and a cat tail... and they didn't have that artificial scent characteristic of Genetically Modified Humans...
Wait?! Another person with cat ears and a cat tail?! And without the scent of a Genetically Modified Human?!
Didn't that mean that person might be one of her own kind?!
At this thought, Hong Guoguo jolted. Her stalled brain instantly snapped into gear, and she hurriedly asked Hyacine:
"Sister Hyacine, where... where is Excellency Cipher right now?! I want to go find her..."
Hyacine was slightly stunned. She thought the girl would press for details about that terrifying giant beast, but it turned out her primary concern was Cipher.
Nevertheless, she answered honestly: "Senior Cipher is outside, likely dealing with the... well, the structural repair issues for the buildings caught in the wake of my attack."
"Thank you, Sister Hyacine!"
Upon hearing Hyacine's information, the single-minded Hong Guoguo didn't even notice the phrase "caught in the wake of my attack." Instead, she chanted an incantation she didn't understand to hide her cat ears and tail, then dashed out of the clinic.
Just as she stepped outside, Hong Guoguo saw dozens of people standing in a circle. A familiar voice was drifting out from the center of the crowd.
Hong Guoguo eagerly squeezed her way in and, sure enough, saw Cipher standing there.
"Genesis Tech brought a terrifying beast upon us because of their evil deeds, causing the buildings around Eternal Joy Street to be torn to pieces. Your personal property has been destroyed by this disaster."
"However, I can drastically reduce your losses! For just one thousand Credits per person, I can 'restore' your buildings and every item inside to their original state! I guarantee they will be exactly as they were before the disaster!"
Cipher's voice was clear and powerful, carrying a strange, inexplicable persuasiveness.
The crowd broke into a flurry of discussion after hearing this.
"For real? Everything is damaged like this and she can restore it? Is she just here to scam us?"
"Maybe that's her special ability and she wants to make a quick buck?"
"Hard to say..."
Seeing their skepticism, Cipher didn't get annoyed. She simply continued:
"I don't need you all to hand over a thousand Credits at once. I'll help whoever pays me first to repair their building. That should set your minds at ease."
Hearing this, the hesitant crowd looked at one another until one man stepped forward.
"I can pay you right now. Can you help me fix mine?"
With that, the man transferred one thousand Credits and pointed toward a collapsed house nearby.
"Easy!"
Seeing this, Cipher immediately consumed the Credits to activate the restoration ability.
Under the stunned gazes of the crowd, she simply gave the pile of rubble a light tap. A profound magic circle flashed briefly on the ground, and immediately following, the shattered bricks and twisted steel bars seemed to be pulled by invisible hands. They retracted and reorganized at high speed. In a mere dozen seconds, a perfectly intact house stood once again on the street.
The man's eyes lit up as he rushed into his house to check. A moment later, he ran out excitedly, stammering, "It's a miracle! Everything is really back! Even the half-cup of water on my table was restored! This is amazing!"
Seeing this, the majority of the others began to believe Cipher's words and scrambled to have her help repair their buildings.
'This ability... isn't this the seventh-circle magic, Great Restoration, that only powerful mages in our world can cast?!'
Hong Guoguo's heart hammered against her ribs as she watched. She became increasingly convinced that Cipher was a fellow countryman who, like her, had accidentally ended up in this world.
As the saying goes: when fellow countrymen meet, their eyes fill with tears. Hong Guoguo had so much she wanted to vent to a member of her own race. However, seeing that Cipher was swamped with work restoring buildings, she had to suppress her excitement and wait obediently to the side, her eyes sparkling with anticipation.
...
United States of Pacific, Genting District.
At a conference table, four holographic projections gradually solidified into the figures of three men and one woman.
"Mr. Otto, I heard... that branch you planned to use as a foothold in the Chaos Capital was destroyed anyway, even after the Final Protocol was activated..."
A man wearing a military-style coat spoke first, using a peculiar tone to address the man in the white long-coat beside him.
The man known as Mr. Otto replied calmly:
"Mr. Mishima, we all witnessed the strength of that monster. If it had been your branch, I'm afraid your performance wouldn't even have matched theirs."
Mishima snorted at Otto's retort. He was about to speak again but was cut off by a man in a dark suit.
"If you two have time to argue here, you'd be better off using it to calculate my losses."
The man's voice carried a hint of subtle agitation. His fingers tapped unconsciously on the virtual tabletop while he narrowed his eyes at Otto.
"Mr. Otto, the resources you used to establish that branch were transported there at great expense to me. You promised that within six months of its founding, most of the Chaos Capital would be under your control, allowing me to open several more transnational logistics lines there."
"And the result? Your 'lightning fireworks show' went off, and all the resources I spent helping you transport an entire branch across borders have gone down the drain. This isn't a debt that can be wiped clean with a simple 'the monster was too strong.'"
★ ★ ★
T/N: As always, feel free to inform me of any mistranslation.